feet. Thus sawtimber growth exceeded drain by 

 more than 60 percent. However, because more than 

 one-thud o£ the sawtimber drain was in high-quality 

 logs, and because much of the growth was in small 

 timber, the growth of high-quality logs failed by 84 

 million board feet (32 percent) to equal drain. 



The net growth of growing stock exceeded drain 

 by more than 65 percent. The growth of growing 

 stock was 267 million cubic feet, while timber cut- 

 ting removed 161 million cubic feet. Of this, 56 

 million cubic feet was cut from pole trees, mainly 

 for fuelwood and mine timbers. 



A Forest Improvement Program.— The generally 

 understocked condition of Kentucky forests and the 

 generally low volume and quality of the sawtimber 

 indicate that forest production can be greatly in- 

 creased. Under good management and protection 

 the forests of the State could double or triple their 



sawtimber volume. Even now the growing-stock vol- 

 ume is increasing, but special effort is needed to 

 concentrate this growth on larger, high-quality 

 trees. Several things can be done to build up the 

 growing-stock volume and to improve the timber 

 quality: (1) Adopt cutting practices, starting on good 

 sites, that will remove the low-quality and cull 

 trees and allow the rapid-growing potentially 

 high-quality trees to grow to a diameter of at least 

 16 inches and larger before harvesting; (2) protect 

 all forest land from fire, insects, and disease; (3) 

 discourage livestock grazing on hardwood timber- 

 land; (4) conduct research to determine the best 

 management and utilization practices for the for- 

 ests of Kentucky; and (5) encourage integiated 

 harvesting, marketing, and utilization of forest 

 products to help channel high-quality timber to uses 

 requiring high-quality timber and to expand the 

 use of low-quality wood. 



Forest Resource Report A'o. 7, U. S. Department of Agriculture 



